


What the Road To Hell Is Paved With

by Fenix21



Category: Supernatural
Genre: Angst, Consensual Underage Sex, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Hurt!Sam, Hurt/Comfort, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-05-03
Updated: 2015-05-03
Packaged: 2018-03-28 20:21:41
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Underage
Chapters: 6
Words: 15,673
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/3868531
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Fenix21/pseuds/Fenix21
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>
  <em>Christ he tried so hard to empty out his head of all the visions of Sam, tried to shoot them out his dick night after night in the mildewed showers of cheap-ass motels under lukewarm water, to drain himself so dry that he’d never again imagine Sam’s supple, willow thin body stretched out on a bed, all open and inviting Dean to touch.</em>
</p><p> </p><p> </p><p>Dean knows it's wrong to lust after his baby brother. He <i>knows</i> it...</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

  * For [Linden](https://archiveofourown.org/users/Linden/gifts).



> Because she wanted pancakes, and she listened to me whine about my failure in writing young Sam and Dean, and I just really owe her a lot for this particular piece :) And of course, because I _did_ promise pretty boys doing naughty things...

Dean Winchester had been lusting after his little brother since a Werewolf forced the scrawny little fourteen year old to lengthen out his gate for the very first time, and Dean had seen the sudden appearance of supple corded muscles working under worn fabric in the dim silver haze of moonlight to gain distance on the monster that brought death at Sam’s heels.

 _Trick of the moonlight_ , Dean told himself, and for the first time in his life fumbled the draw on his gun.

‘Dean! Get down!’

John’s voice cracked across the clearing and Dean dropped on instinct. The wolf, attracted by the new sound, swerved, leaped Dean’s prone form and raked a fearsome set of claws in John’s direction before two sharp rapports from his Bereta loaded with silver dropped it out of the air.

Dean carried no little amount of guilt over that night, and not just because it was the first time his cock had twitched at the flash-thought of his hands running all over Sam’s naked flesh, but because the reaction had caused him to hesitate so long that John wound up taking a long gash to his shoulder blade getting in the way of the thing so he could get a shot in before it devoured his baby boy. 

‘Fuck, Dad, this is deep,’ Dean whispered raggedly, pressing another thick patch of gauze that Sam handed him over his shoulder over the wound.

‘Just—pour the holy water over it,’ John gritted. ‘Get back to the hotel and stitch it.’

Half delirious with pain he might be, but John’s tone left no room for argument, and the disappointment in his eldest son’s sudden hesitation was clear. Dean averted his gaze, taped the wound closed as best he could in the half light of the moon, and did as John ordered.

Although, the situation would never have occurred if Sammy hadn’t disobeyed Dean for the very first time in his life. Dad, sure, Sam disobeyed Dad all the time, but Dean? Sam always, always did what Dean told him to and this time Dean had told him to stay in the damn car. But Sam’s curiosity was getting the better of him these days, and all that training that Dad and Dean kept insisting on had to be working up to something, so Sam had decided to see what it was all about.

‘Dammit, Sammy! The car. I told you to stay. In. The fucking. Car!’ Dean shouted, palm smacking against the steering wheel with a loud crack that caused Sam to flinch further into the corner of the backseat, and _dammit_. Sam had never flinched from him before. Never. John’s commanding tone, yes, but Dean? Christ. What the hell was he turning into?

Dean would probably never forgive himself for nearly letting Sam be gutted by that werewolf, but he was so furious—at Sam, at himself, at the Werewolf—that he didn’t talk to Sam for three days while the kid followed him around like a whipped puppy, pleading and begging for Dean to forgive him, to say something—anything!—or to at least hit him if that would make him feel better.

‘Please, Dean. Please! I’m sorry. I promise I’ll never do it again,’ Sammy whined, tears collecting on his lashes, and Dean had to turn away because all he wanted to do was reach out and cup the kid’s face and tip his head back and kiss those tears from his cheeks and rub his hands over his shoulders and down his thin back and fit him close against the length of his body like he had done a hundred— _thousand_ —times in the past.

He resisted though, mumbled something about gassing up the car before they had to leave at five the next morning, because he wasn’t supposed to feel like letting his fingers, as they traversed down his baby brother’s knobby spine, slot into the carved spaces between Sam’s ribs because they just couldn’t feed the kid enough to keep up with his growth spurts, or dip his hand down the back of his jeans that were a half inch too short but way too loose on his bony hips and flatten his palm into the sweet curve at the base of Sam’s spine, or tug him close and fit the aching swell of his cock against Sam’s soft flat belly that Dean now knew was hiding the beginnings to a Michaelangelo’s worth of beautifully carved muscles.

He wasn’t suppose to feel any of that when he looked into those warm, wet, dark eyes that were open all the way down to the bottom of Sam’s soul. He’d go to hell for thoughts like that, no matter his good intentions of comforting his little brother. 

So he turned away and grabbed the keys and left.


	2. Chapter 2

Banning himself from touching Sam in any way that wasn’t strictly necessary to his care and safety was turning out to be a twofold bitch of a problem.

It made life hell for Dean, and that was without his little brother’s constant guilty sulking brought on by his older brother’s sudden subtle but definite change in attitude to him, because Dean didn’t realize how much he touched Sam on a daily basis without even realizing it. Little brushes of fingertips, knuckles against the kid’s cheek or ear, fingers sifting through and ruffling his soft floppy hair, knees knocking or ankles and feet tangling together under diner tables. 

Sparring became a torture session that Dean figured might just rank with getting his blood drawn slowly from his body by some particularly sadistic vampire, only with Sam it was his resistance because being in such close proximity and usually with nothing more than thin track shorts and tees on to separate them from skin to skin contact was a drain on Dean’s will power like no vamp on earth could possibly be to his jugular.

There was a tension between them now, too, when they sparred. Part of it was just Sam’s age, Dean knew. He remembered that roiling heat of teenage angst that had no cause and no outlet and sat in his belly like lead, licking at his insides and making his blood run hot and shivery and the only thing he could do to alleviate it was jack off long and hard in the shower or beat the living shit out of the most recent monster John let him come along on the hunt for.

The rest of it…well, Dean supposed he was to blame for that.

Sam was hurt and confused, never in his life having been denied the comfort of everyday contact from his brother who was closer to him than any other human being alive. That hurt and confusion sat and simmered in his gut and got all mixed up with all the rest of the teenage angst and the anger at John that was becoming more frequent and fiery, and it came out in their sparring sessions in sharper, harder punches, quicker blocks, more well balance kicks and lunges.

On the one hand, Dean was impressed with the sudden improvement in Sam’s fighting skills and the incredible laser focus of his already finely honed powers of concentration. On the other hand, Dean was getting the shit kicked out of him more often than not nowadays, and there were moments when the sun caught in Sam’s eyes and glinted dangerously, that he was not so sure his little brother was one hundred percent in control of himself.

Which was why Dean occasionally played dirty.

‘Dammit, Dean! That’s not fair!’ Sam fumed, twisting and thrashing under Dean where he was still pinned, but not by much, and grappling to try and get a hold on his older brother’s body that he could use as leverage.

‘Think the monsters are gonna play fair, Sammy? Huh?’ Dean asked, thrusting his hips down hard and forcing Sam to stillness.

‘Get. The. Fuck. Off,’ Sam seethed, eyes flashing bright and hard in the mid-afternoon sun. But his actions belied his words, thighs closing tight around Dean’s leg, fingers digging hard into his brother’s taut biceps; and Dean’s breath suddenly ran out.

 _Too close…too close!_ The voice in his head warned him, high and tight.

Dean shoved away, bouncing to his feet in one smooth motion leaving Sam looking shocked and furious in the dust.

‘Fine,’ he said, turning back toward the motel, because seeing Sam all splayed on the ground, chest heaving, lips parted, cheeks flushed, and eyes on fire, was Dean’s final straw, and he wasn’t even sure the nearby reservoir had enough cold water for the shower he was going to need. ‘I get first shower.’

Then there were the sleeping arrangements. 

John wasn’t around a whole lot once he dumped them off someplace these days. If he didn’t skip town within twenty-four hours, then he spent most of his time either scouting information from the locals which often somehow meandered its way to the nearest bar or passed out over his journal and research at whatever rickety table the motel had to offer, leaving both queen beds free for the taking. Dean had never balked once about letting Sam crawl in under the covers with him and curl his small, thin, bony body up into the hollow of Dean’s belly to let himself be cradled by the curve of Dean’s broad chest and long thighs as he wrapped himself around his little brother and held him safe against whatever the night might bring to their door. It didn’t matter if there were two free beds, or not, Sam nearly always ended up snugged against Dean by morning in one or the other of them. 

Now, though, Dean waited until Sam was well asleep before he even attempted to turn in for the night, and those nights that John was actually around and did use the other bed, Dean slipped under the blanket but not the sheet and clung to the edge of the mattress like a drowning man wrapped around the only stick of driftwood on the whole wide ocean. 

He tried. Christ he tried so hard to empty out his head of all the visions of Sam, tried to shoot them out his dick night after night in the mildewed showers of cheap-ass motels under lukewarm water, to drain himself so dry that he’d never again imagine Sam’s supple, willow thin body stretched out on a bed, all open and inviting Dean to touch. Because he wanted to touch. He wanted to touch Sam, _needed_ to touch him like his next breath depended on it. 

But he didn’t dare, he just didn’t, because there were far too many mornings cropping up on him that he woke from the warm clinging haze of a dream that featured his little brother’s bare limbs wrapped all around him, rubbing against him, and Dean’s morning wood was so hard it tented the sheets. On the worst ones he’d wake up to a cooling sticky mess of cum pooled on his belly, and Sam sitting in the next bed watching him with a curiously intent and strangely hopeful look, and there would be an echo of Sam’s name ringing in his ears that Dean hoped with a fervor he hadn’t spoken out loud.


	3. Chapter 3

The year turned over, Sam put on two more inches, and Dean got a grip on his cock in deference to his little brother, sometimes more literally than others, and the two of them had slipped back into a routine that might almost be called normal. It wasn’t the same as it had been, and Dean wondered with no little amount of regret if it ever would be, but it could almost be called comfortable.

They had been shacked up for the last three months in a rundown house on the edge of some small Kentucky town. Sam was on the debate team and had tried out for soccer last week. He even had a couple of friends he had started hanging out with on the weekends. Dean had gotten a job at the local hardware store and had even asked the same little waitress at the local cafe out two Friday nights running.

Which meant it was about time for John to blow back into town and screw up everything.

Seeing as how he was never one to disappoint, he showed up right on time the night before Sam’s state championship debate event, grizzled, dirty, and smelling like three day old sweat and booze to pack them up and take them eleven hundred miles north west to Idaho, but on the way there was a tribal spirit god that needed putting to rest.

Sam threw an epic bitch-fit, the likes and increasing frequency of which over the last year had been what prompted John to leave his boys behind more and more often while he went on hunts alone much to Dean’s dismay and aggravation. He didn’t mind taking care of Sammy. He always had taken care of him, but by the time Dean was his age, he had long been taken out on hunts. Maybe not the most dangerous ones, but still. John was training Sam, putting him through all the same paces and expecting Dean to keep up both their training, but he was leaving Sam behind, and by default Dean, more and more of late because Sam wouldn’t quit complaining about how much school he was missing and how he never got to do anything ‘normal’ and that the work they did was too dangerous and crazy and how much their lives just sucked in general.

So, Dean was a little surprised that John had even bothered to actually come back and retrieve them, but it turned out this next hunt was going to need more man power than what John could muster by himself.

They ended up in the Minnesota woods after a Gorabaer, a particularly nasty supernatural cousin to the North American Grizzly, touted to be the vengeance seeking soul of a Native American shaman who, when his tribe was on the brink of death from disease or starvation or ambush or whatever the fuck the European stooges had rained down on them, he took the souls of the those remaining alive and compressed them into himself and with the blessings of whatever gods he prayed to became this immortal freakin’ grizzly that tended to attack anything that came near it. Fortunately their territory wasn’t too wide—bounded by the tribe’s original claim of ownership—and this one was living in some pretty undeveloped country, though some surveyors had gone missing when some corporate dip-shit had suddenly decided to scout out the area to build a resort about six months ago, and then a smattering of hikers since then. 

Sam had simmered down a hundred miles or so back and was just sulking in the backseat beneath the heap of debate notes he no longer needed and giving the cardboard box of research for John’s most recent hunt that sat in the footwell the evil eye for taking up his leg space. Dean managed to catch a couple of hours of shut eye against the window when he was sure Sam wasn’t going to reach across the seat back and try to strangle their father when he wasn’t looking. John just drove them deeper into the woods until the road got too narrow and even for the Impala to traverse without the risk of snapping her axels or drive shaft. 

When he finally pulled off and parked, Dean rolled stiffly out of the front seat and Sam started to scoot across to get out of the back, but John grabbed the door and shoved it back.

‘You stay in the car,’ he said.

‘What the hell, Dad?’ Sam started.

‘Stay in the car.’

‘You said you needed more manpower,’ Sam objected.

John squinted down at him. ‘Yeah, well I don’t need you bitching over every move I make. So. You’re in the car.’

Sam glared and shoved himself back across the seat, huffed a breath into his bangs, and folded his arms tight around his thin ribs.

Dean leaned back in over the front seat. ‘Sam—.’

‘Just fucking go, already,’ Sam snapped. ‘I’ll stay here.’

‘Sam…’ 

‘I _promise.’_

It wasn’t how Dean wanted this to go, but at nearly midnight in the middle of fucking nowhere after an eight hour drive, he wasn’t in the mood to argue with either of them. He pushed back out of the car, slammed the door, and went back to the trunk to help John gather the weapons they would need.

They tracked the creature back to its lair within a half hour, which was good because despite it being April and wearing his heavy leather coat Dean was still chilling to the bone, but things were going well, better than usual honestly, and John had the damn thing in his gun site when Sam suddenly came hurtling through the trees with a handful of his silver throwing knives that Dean had gotten him as a not-Christmas present three years ago when the kid had shown an aptitude for splitting a hair with a blade at fifty feet, but still couldn’t manage to bullseye a beer can with a .45. 

Silver sang through the air and then there was a knife buried in the Gorabaer’s brainstem. A good shot. A kill shot on anything maybe a third less the size, but on this thing? Just pissed it off.

‘Sam!’ Dean yelled, hearing John curse profusely behind him, and lunged out of cover toward his little brother who was still hurtling full speed toward the giant mass of roaring fur and eight-fucking-inch claws. John popped off a couple of shots to try and get the thing’s attention as it turned to meet Sam’s charge, but it didn’t even twitch his way, silver bullets or no. 

Sam let fly two more knives, driving them home into each of the creature’s eyes, but he didn’t stop there. He could have, and Dean wasn’t understanding why the kid was trying to get in so fucking close. Even blinded the thing was putting up a helluva fight, and those claws…those claws were way to fucking close to Sam’s thin, dodging body for Dean’s comfort.

‘Sammy!’ Dean yelled again and scrambled forward over the thick underbrush trying to reach his brother before those claws found their mark. 

Sam dodged left, ducked under the thing’s flailing arm, plunged a blade up under its jaw and spun away but not fast enough. Blind and muted and pissed the hell off, the mountain of a spirit-bear swiped wildly and caught a claw across Sam’s thigh. 

Sam didn’t scream. He didn’t cry out or even whimper. He did go down, though, and Dean came thundering through the broken undergrowth seeing more red than just his baby brother’s blood welling up out of the wound on his leg.

‘Dean! The heart—cut it out!’ Sam shouted as he tossed his last knife up into the air for Dean to catch as he came barreling past him.

Dean was honestly surprised when just his weight was enough to throw the Gorabaer off balance and send them both crashing to the forest floor, but all of Sam’s silver in him must have finally been taking a toll. Dean fisted the last knife into the thing’s chest as they went over and wrenched down with all his might, digging through flesh and muscle, hot blood pouring over his hand and making his grip slip. Off to the side, he could hear John yelling and pumping the thing full of silver bullets to try and keep it from ripping Dean off and apart as he cut even deeper and then jerked the knife in a carving motion and reached in with his other hand to rip the heart out of its chest and throw it on the ground.

John plugged the organ, steaming eerily and giving up a last couple of feeble thumps in the cold night air, with two shots just to be sure and the instant he did, the creature under Dean went still.

‘Fucking Christ…’ Dean muttered, sliding free of the thing, backing off and then promptly doubling over to puke in the nearest bush. He’d done a lot of weird shit in his lifetime, but ripping the heart out of some supernatural grizzly bear? That kind of topped the current top-forty. He swiped a hand across the back of his mouth and nearly puked again when he caught the stinking scent of the thing’s blood that he had just thoughtlessly smeared all over his face. He gagged and drug his coat sleeve across his nose and mouth, cleaning as much of the gore away as he could before pushing himself back into a standing position.

‘Dean. Get over here.’

John’s tone was sharp and urgent from where he knelt in the bracken, hands clenched on his youngest son’s leg and bearing down hard to staunch the bleeding. Dean staggered over and dropped down across from John.

‘Fuck,’ he whispered, swallowing another surge of bile in his throat at the sight of Sam’s thigh laid open and welling blood. ‘Dad?’

‘It missed the artery,’ John said tightly without looking up, ‘but it’s deep. Give me your shirt.’

Dean shucked his coat and stripped off his flannel shirt. He gripped the hem and jerked hard, tearing off a long, wide strip. He held it out to John.

‘Wrap it,’ John commanded, still holding the wound together as best he could.

‘What the fuck, Sammy?’ Dean murmured as he wrapped the strip and tucked it in on itself and tore off another. ‘What were you thinking? Told you to stay in the damn car.’

‘Was reading,’ Sam said shortly, teeth gritted together to keep from screaming out at the pain as his brother pulled the makeshift bandage tight. ‘Was reading the research…silver bullets just…stun it. Has to be a knife. Th-the eyes, tongue, heart. Gotta cut out the heart.’

Dean tucked in the end of the bandage and leaned on his knees, arms finally starting to shake a little from the let down. ‘Could you not have fucking figured this out _before_ we got out of the car?’

’S-sorry.’ Sam’s teeth were starting to chatter. He was only dressed in his worn jeans, which were now shredded down most of one leg, and a tissue thin t-shirt with a hoodie pulled on over it. But Dean knew it was more than the chilly spring air making Sam start to shake. John’s hands were covered in blood, and if the moon had been more than a sliver in the sky, Dean was sure he’d have been able to see the pool beneath his brother’s body because he could sure as hell smell it.

‘Take your brother to the car,’ John ordered as he thrust up from the ground.

‘Dad, what—?’

‘I’m gonna get Sam’s knives and torch this son of a bitch. We can’t leave it here.’

‘It’ll burn down the whole fucking forest, Dad!’ Dean protested. ‘And we can’t afford the time to stay and watch it. We gotta get Sam to a hospital.’

‘Go,’ was all John said as he turned to dig out the salt and lighter fluid from their duffle. 

Dean swore viciously, but his voice was low and soothing as he bent over Sam and took hold of his wrists. The kid would have balked any other time about his brother trying to carry him, probably still would after this was all over, and if Dean didn’t still have the thick threads of adrenaline pumping through his veins, Sam would probably feel a lot more like the five foot eight inches and hundred and forty pounds that he was instead of feather light and too goddamn thin and rangy to have just nearly single handedly taken down the huge son of a bitch that lay a few yards away from them.

‘Come on, Sammy, arms around my neck,’ Dean coaxed like he had when Sam had been small, and Sam obeyed and held tight as he could while Dean lifted him off the cold ground. 

‘C-cold, Dean,’ Sam chattered.

‘I know. Gonna get you warmed up. Don’t worry,’ Dean said. He snagged his coat with a couple of fingers on the way up off the ground and headed in the direction of the car. He prayed John would hurry the fuck up because he could already feel Sam’s whole body starting to tremble against him. ‘Just hang with me, Sammy, okay.’

Sam made a weak sound and dropped his head forward to bury it in Dean’s throat and Dean ran through every Latin incantation he knew in an attempt to keep the sudden sharp thrust of misplaced desire at bay that was turning his whole body warm and making his jeans just a little too snug. Because what the fuck? His little brother was bleeding in his arms and all his dick was interested in was how perfectly every plane and curve of the long, lithe body he held fit against him, how soft Sam’s breath was, coming in short little puffs against Dean’s skin, how much better it would be if Sam’s breath were coming that short because Dean was smoothing his hands over him, over every last inch of soft skin, and pressing, molding….

‘Goddammit,’ Dean swore again.

‘D-Dean?’ Sam’s arms tightened around his neck. ‘Dean, I’m sorry. I just thought…I thought if you and Dad didn’t know, and you thought you killed it and then…you got to close…. It would have ripped you to shreds, Dean.’ Sam’s voice went shrill and broke and he tucked in closer to his brother’s chest, and Dean knew the convulsions he felt through his arms and chest were not from the shock or blood loss but from Sam’s sobs.

‘Hey, hey, just—.’ Dean sighed and ducked his head to give Sam a quick kiss to the top of his head. ‘Forget about it for now. We’ll talk about it later. We need to get you patched up right now.’

Sam had left the car wide open in his apparent rush to get to Dean and John, and Dean would have to remind him later to be a hell of a lot more careful, but for now at least he didn’t have to jostle Sam trying to get the door unlocked and open. He braced a knee on the seat and carefully lowered Sam down. Sam’s breath hitched and he let out the first whine of pain since the Gorabaer had flayed him. 

‘Sorry, kiddo.’

Sam gave a quick shake of his head and let loose of Dean’s neck. He pulled himself backward across the seat to lean on the door and Dean slid in after him. The Impala’s dome light wasn’t much in the pitch black of the dense forest, but it was enough to see that the strips of Dean’s shirt tied around the wound were soaked through already and Sam’s skin was a lot closer to the shade of pale vengeful spirit than warm human being. Sam wrapped his arms around himself and tucked further into the corner, shivering. Dean spread his coat around Sam’s thin shoulders and the kid burrowed into it, but after a few minutes of the shivers still not subsiding, Dean muttered something to himself about fools and temptation and backed out of the car, came around the other side and slid in behind Sam.

‘C’mere.’ He hauled Sam up onto his lap, situating himself in such a way that he could get his foot up on the center hump on the floor and prop Sam’s bleeding leg up. 

‘Dean, you don’t have to—. I know you don’t want to—.’

Dean scowled at Sam’s lurching protests. ‘Don’t wanna what?’

Sam just shook his head and turned further into Dean’s chest and pulled his coat up under his ears. 

John made it back to the car about fifteen minutes later. He threw their gear in the trunk and slid in to the driver’s seat, taking a second to lean over the back and look at Dean. ‘How is he?’

‘Still bleeding pretty bad,’ Dean said. ‘Dad, we’re a hundred fucking miles from nowhere. Sam needs a hospital. You got a plan?’

John turned back around and brought the engine to life with a rumble that seemed way too loud in the stillness surrounding them, and Sam twitched and moaned in Dean’s arms. 

‘There’s a hunter’s cabin about thirty miles east. It’s one of Bobby’s. Hopefully it’s still standing and at least got a few supplies.’

‘Dad, I think—,’ Dean started to protest, to insist they find a hospital.

‘It’s just a flesh wound, Dean. It’s deep, but I’ve had worse. You’ve seen ‘em. We’ll stitch him up. He’ll be fine.’ John turned back front and put the Impala in gear and that as good as ended the conversation. 

Dean pressed his lips into a thin line and bit back against any further protest. John would have none of it anyway. Hospitals were places you only went if you were dying and/or already dead as far as John was concerned. They asked way too many questions, and it was getting harder and harder to fake their way through the insurance card scam, so. No hospital.


	4. Chapter 4

Sam was in a light doze by the time they got to the cabin, and Dean carried him inside while John shouldered some of their gear and preceded him with gun in hand just in case.

‘Wait here,’ John said and disappeared back out the door.

Dean shifted Sam against his chest, felt the sleepy hum he made against his collar bone, and another spike of _pleasurelustdesire_ speared through him, making his belly clench up with the disgust that followed. The last forty-five minutes had damn near been Dean’s undoing. He’d spent a lot of time over the last months keeping his thoughts and urges under control and his damn hands off of his brother in an attempt to nip any temptation in the bud. He couldn’t seem to help the rush of blood to his groin that kept him half-hard all the way here because of Sam’s ass, which was bony and cut into his thighs and should in no way be a turn on, being in his lap.

God, he was a sick fuck. 

John got the generator going and came back a minute later to  switch on a small lamp on a small table in the small one room cabin that was—besides a good couple years worth of dust—relatively clean if spartan of furniture besides the aforementioned lamp and table, one armchair, a folding table with a couple of chairs, and a double bed on a box frame in the corner. 

Dean headed for the bed with Sam and gently laid him out, snugging his coat up around his shoulders before leaving him to help John with their stuff. They hauled in Sam and Dean’s duffles and the box of non-perishable foodstuffs that got kept in the trunk for just these kind of occasions, and some of the weapons, bags of salt, and a couple of gallons of holy water.

‘Take care of your brother,’ John said and turned away to set the salt lines up at the doors and windows. 

Dean frowned at him, confused. ‘Dad, your stitches are way better than mine. This thing’s gonna scar like hell anyway, but if you—.’

John straightened, grabbed the box of canned and boxed goods and deposited them in the tiny kitchenette that wasn’t more than a mini fridge, hotplate, and a utility sink, but hey, there was running water. That was a win. Meant there was probably some closet of a bathroom behind the door to the side of the sink, too, then. 

‘I’ve got to go meet some contacts. I’m already late.’

Dean stared at John, med kit in his hand forgotten in his shock. He shouldn’t be surprised. He really shouldn’t. How had he thought this would go, anyway? John sweeping into town to snatch them out of a few months of damn near _normal_ comfort where they hadn’t heard hide nor hair of anything supernatural besides a couple of pathetic hauntings that were only causing more annoyance than harm that he and Sam had taken care of on their own, and then dumping them in the middle of nowhere with next to nothing for reasons he still hadn’t explained and wasn’t likely to before he walked out that goddamn door. Again.

Dean felt an unfamiliar fury rise up in him. Something that he imagined Sam might feel, but that he usually didn’t. 

‘You’ve got….’ He swallowed and tried again. ‘You got _contacts_ to meet? You’re gonna fucking _leave_! When your youngest son is bleeding out in some mouldering cabin in BFE?’

John’s eyes flared wide for just a second at Dean’s outburst. It was the kind of reaction he would have expected from Sam, but not his eldest, not Dean. Dean was the good son, the one who didn’t ask questions. John couldn’t possibly have any delusions that Dean wasn’t always happy with how this crazy ship of theirs got run, but he nearly always kept his thoughts about it to himself. 

‘Watch your language, son, and yes. I have contacts to meet. I’ll be back.’

‘When?’ Dean demanded.

‘I’ll be back,’ John repeated with a tone of finality. ‘There’s antibiotics in the kit. Give him a double dose tonight and in the morning, and wash the wound out with holy water just to be on the safe side.

Dean didn’t have a chance to respond before John was back out the door and the Impala was pulling away, her familiar, rumbling purr growing faint in the distance.

‘Son of a bitch,’ Dean spat and spun around. 

But all the vehemence in his tone evaporated when he spied Sam looking at him with wide, dark eyes from the bed, Dean’s coat clutched in his fists and held tight under his chin. He looked all of about five years old again and afraid of the dark, waiting for his big brother to banish the monsters from the closet before he would go to sleep. Dean grabbed up the small duffle that held the rest of their medical supplies and went over to the bed. 

‘Hey, kiddo. How’re you doin’?’

‘Still c-cold,’ Sam stammered. ‘Leg hurts.’

‘Yeah, I’m gonna fix that for you, Sammy, just hang tight.’ Dean set the supplies down on the floor. ‘Let me get a fire going and get some light over here. ‘Fraid you’re stuck with my handiwork. Know Dad’s got the steadier hand, but….’

‘’S fine, Dean,’ Sam said in a tiny voice. ‘I prefer you.’

Dean looked over his shoulder and saw those dark eyes looking at him with an intensity he couldn’t quite put his finger on the cause of, but it was making that warm puddle of want that had been sitting in his belly under such close guard for the last several months start to spread and push outward. He turned back to the hearth where the cabin’s last occupant had thoughtfully left a nice sized stack of split logs and a some rolled up newspapers to use as kindling. Dean stacked up a few logs, lit a roll of paper with his Zippo and made sure the flames were starting to catch before he went to wrestle with the lighting situation and managed, between the lamp’s blessedly long cord and rearranging the furniture so that the bed was pulled a foot and a half further down the wall, to get enough light that he would be able to see what his hands were doing on Sam’s leg.

Now for the fun part.

Dean pressed the antibiotics at Sam with a swig of holy water until he could test the water from the tap to be sure it was still drinkable, and then pulled out the painkillers and the bourbon. Sam screwed up his face.

‘Take your pick, little brother,’ Dean said with a tense smile. ‘Personally, I’d recommend both.’

‘I’ll be fine,’ Sam insisted. 

Dean sighed and unscrewed the cap on the bottle of bourbon. ‘Seriously, Sam, you’re gonna need something. I’m gonna have to put like thirty stitches in your leg. So, come on. Take a swig. ‘Cause I know you’re just gonna puke up the painkillers.’

It was true. They hadn’t yet managed to find anything above the level of Ibuprofen that could stay settled on Sam’s picky stomach. He inevitably ended up throwing them back up within an hour. No sense wasting good drugs. Sam shook his head again, but Dean pressed the bottle at him.

‘At least just a swallow, to take the edge off. We’ll see how you do after that,’ he said. 

Sam took the bottle reluctantly, wrinkled his nose up as he got it near his mouth and then tipped it back for a huge, burning swallow that left him breathless.

‘Atta boy,’ Dean smiled, taking the bottle and setting it down at his feet, then he set to work.

After divesting Sam of the remains of his jeans, Dean found the wound was blessedly straight and clean when he unwrapped it, and he thanked every version of every deity he could rattle off the top of his head, though it was still awfully damn deep. So deep, in fact, he thought he might have to run two sets of stitches in order to keep it closed long enough to heal especially given that it was across a major muscle group that Sam would be flexing with about every move he made. Jagged flesh would have made the job ten times worse and the scar left behind ugly, and Dean hated the thought of scars on Sam’s body. He had plenty of his own, and that was okay with Dean, they were kind of like badges of honor, wounds from a war no one knew was going on; but Sam’s body was pretty much virgin territory except for a few minor cuts and scrapes, until now anyway. 

Dean poured the holy water over the wound and then doused it with the contents of the bottle at his feet, offering Sam another swig when he gasped, bit down on his lip and fisted Dean’s coat so hard the leather creaked. He grimaced when Sam refused the bottle but didn’t fight him and went to work on stitching. 

Sam’s skin was soft and hot under Dean’s hands, something he didn’t fail to notice even as fresh blood welled up to hinder his work, making the edges of Sam’s sliced skin harder to see. He daubed it away and continued across Sam’s thigh one stitch at a time. The wound was almost seven inches long and ran from the middle of his left thigh up and inward toward his groin. It was just a damn good thing it wasn’t an inch longer or it might have laid open that artery John had been initially worried about. 

Dean paused for a second and took a steadying breath, suddenly lightheaded from the brief flash of Sam stone white and cold on the forest floor because there would have been no way to stop that kind of bleeding in time, and even if they had, there was no hospital in range that could help them after. Sam would have lost a leg at best and died at worst.

He breathed in again, swallowed thick and audible, and nearly gagged anyway at the bile surging up the back of his throat, until he felt a timid hand at the side of his neck. He jerked his gaze up. Sam was looking at him, face all open and concerned and half-fearful, overriding the pain that had to be coursing through him at the work Dean was doing on his leg.

‘Dean?’

Dean shook his head a little, trying to pull away from that hand, the hand of which he wanted more than anything to just turn his head a fraction to the side and plant a kiss in the palm. ‘I’m fine kiddo. Sorry.’

Sam dropped his hand a little reluctantly it seemed and clutched the coat to his chest again, resetting his teeth against the pain as Dean threaded his skin with the needle again. As Dean worked in toward Sam’s groin, his hands started to shake just a little, not enough that Sam noticed, but enough that Dean had to consciously tense his arms and shoulders to get them to stop, and he shifted on the bed in an attempt to take the pressure off his dick which was pushing to life against the back of his zipper as his knuckles brushed against Sam’s inner thigh while he stitched. 

‘Dean, could you—could you stop for a second?’ Sam asked. ‘I think I’m going to…I need….’ 

He clapped one hand over his mouth and waved the other in the direction of a metal trash can under the utility sink. Dean was up and moving and had the trash can held under Sam’s chin and an arm around his shoulders while he retched long and hard into it.

‘Hey, careful there,’ Dean soothed. ‘You’ll pop my beautiful stitches before I even get done.’

Sam huffed a miserable laugh, wallowed his tongue around his mouth and spit and then lifted his head, breathing unsteadily. ‘’S-Sorry.’

‘Nothin’ to apologize for, Sammy,’ Dean said, sifting his hands through the thick hair at the back of Sam’s head, waiting until Sam gave him the go-ahead to put the trashcan down.

Sam nodded weakly and leaned back against the wall, and Dean took the trashcan and sat it a few feet away but within easy reach if Sam decided he needed to avail himself of it again.

‘Just a few more, Sam,’ Dean said, picking up the needle and bending over Sam’s leg again. ‘'M almost done.’

It turned out Sam needed thirty-seven stitches, and they both sighed in shaky relief when Dean tied off the last one. Sam had gagged a couple more times but managed not to actually throw up, and Dean washed the wound with holy water again, slathered it with anti-biotic ointment and then wrapped it up good and snug.

‘You stay put while I clean this up,’ Dean ordered. ‘Then I’ll get you some fresh clothes and see if I can find any sheets for the bed.’

A battered trunk in the corner revealed a supply of bedding, and Dean was right about the closet of a bathroom off the kitchenette. By some miracle aforethought, Bobby had installed an ancient washing machine opposite the shower, jammed in right beside the toilet. No dryer, but that was okay. It wouldn’t be the first time Dean had hung clothes over any available surface to dry, and at least he wouldn’t be washing them out in the sink. He rinsed the trashcan in the utility sink, bundled the bloody bandages and other supplies into a bag and threw them in the steel bin out back, jamming the lid down tight so the smell hopefully wouldn’t draw any animals. He rummaged the trunk and came up with sheets, a blanket, and a nice heavy quilt, but before he bothered with that, he ran a pan full of steaming hot water, found a washcloth and towel and went over to the bed.

Sam’s color was a shade more toward living, but he was still shivering. Dean knelt down and felt for his pulse, and Sam turned blearily, pain-filled eyes toward his brother. ‘'M okay, Dean. You don’t have to….’

Dean waited a second to see what Sam was going to say, but the kid just closed his eyes and turned his head away, dislodging Dean’s fingers over his pulse point. It was a little fast, but pretty steady and strong enough that Dean didn’t think they needed to worry about full-on hypovolemia any more.

‘Don’t have to what, Sam? You keep saying that. What? You think I don’t want to take care of you, or somethin’?’ Dean asked, keeping his tone level, even though the very thought made him bristle. ‘I’ve been taking care of you my whole life, Sammy. Nothin’s changed.’

‘Something has.’

Dean almost missed it, the tiny whisper into the shadows on the other side of the bed to where Sam had his face turned. ‘Sam?’

But Sam pressed his lips together and kept his face turned away. Dean hesitated a few moments, wondering if maybe he should just cover the kid up with a blanket and leave him for the night. For both their sakes. Sam was still shivering intermittently, though, and needed to be cleaned up and then bundled warmly, so Dean eased down onto the bed and set to work sponging away the blood and mess from Sam’s legs. He pulled one of the towels up to cover him until he had a chance to change the damp bedding and get Sam into his sweats to keep him warm. Next he gently pried his coat from Sam’s fists, draped it down over his legs, too, and then slipped his hands under Sam’s t-shirt. 

It had been a long time since he’d dressed or undressed his brother, and in his months long mission to not touch Sam, he’d almost forgotten just what it felt like to frame that thin ribcage with his broad hands, skimming Sam’s soft, bare skin with his palms as he pushed the shirt up and waited a heartbeat for his little brother to give in and raise his arms up. 

‘That’s it, Sam,’ Dean praised in a whisper, driving down the sudden stab of _wantneed_ at seeing the firelight flicker over Sam’s pale skin. ‘That’s good.’

He rinsed the washcloth and made quick work of wiping Sam’s arms and chest down, strokes efficient and sure but gentle just the same. He lifted Sam against his chest and started wiping down his back. He was holding him with one strong arm and rubbing the cloth in gentle circles with the other when he felt the first body wracking shudder go through Sam.

‘Sam?’

Dean dropped the cloth and pulled Sam close, trying to tip his head back so he could see his face. If he’d started convulsing, that was bad. Very bad. But Sam’s arms snaked around him and held, screwing down tight with more strength that Dean remembered the kid having, and he buried his face in Dean’s neck.

‘Just—stop. Please.’

‘I’m almost done, Sam. Let me get you dried and dressed and—.’

Sam burrowed deeper. ‘Not what I mean.’ 

Dean stilled, held his breath. ‘Sam, just—.’

‘I said I was sorry, Dean. I meant it. I don’t—I don’t know what else to do.’

The shudders were sobs. Dean had held Sam enough over the years through crying fits brought on by tantrums, disappointment, pain, and anger, to recognize that this was fear. Nye on to full blown terror. But of what?

‘Just please stop being mad at me. Please…’ Sam sniffled against Dean’s throat. ‘I’m sorry I got out of the car—.’

‘Sam, I told you, we’d talk about that later—.’

‘But it’s been months, Dean! And you still won’t—won’t even touch me!’

Dean’s breath came out in a huff of shock as Sam’s arms squeezed against his ribs. It was like being caught in a vice, and Dean was amazed again at the strength hiding in those skinny limbs.

‘Sam, I’m not mad,’ Dean murmured. He tried one last time to hold his distance, to just get this done, to take care of Sam like he always had and only feel what he had always felt. Except that he was starting to wonder if he had always felt just like this: like there was a river of warmth running through him at the very thought of holding his baby brother close, a thread of heat strung through his veins that came alive at Sam’s touch and sang through his blood. Because he didn’t feel any different, he just had a name for it now. 

He gave up and dropped his head down, tucking his nose into the soft curls behind Sam’s ear. ‘'M not mad, Sammy. I swear it. I just….’ He shook his head a little, sifted his hand up into the tangle at the back of Sam’s head and scratched lightly. ‘I swear nothing’s changed. You’re still my little brother. I still want to take care of you, and I still…love you.’

Sam flinched at the last words, almost like they stung him in some way, but his arms loosened a little and he let Dean towel him off and pull a clean hoodie over his head, then lay him back and very carefully pull a pair of sweats up his legs. He gathered Sam up and carried him to the one armchair by the fire and tucked a blanket around him, then he went back and dragged the bed closer to the fire and made it up with the sheets and quilt he’d found. He transferred Sam back to the bed and tucked the quilt and blanket close, propping his bad leg on a rolled up towel to keep it elevated. 

He sat down on the edge of the bed and put a hand to Sam’s forehead, testing for fever in the guise of sweeping his bangs out of his eyes. ‘Can you sleep? Do you want the pain killers? Or another shot?’

Sam’s jaw was set tight, and Dean was no fool to believe that he wasn’t in pain, but he just shook his head to all the offers and closed his eyes. Tears dribbled out of the corners and Dean felt a wrenching pain in his chest, like something tearing loose, and he reached out and brushed them away. He hated seeing Sam hurt. He’d hated his first baby teeth and how they’d made him feverish and sick. He’d hated his bumps and bruises and scrapes when he learned to walk and run and spar with his older brother. He hated his broken arm when he’d jumped off that damn shed in Bobby’s salvage yard. He hated anything that caused his little brother pain, and he’d never hurt this much before. 

He’d never been wounded because he’d never fought, and Dean realized with a suddenness that took his breath away, that he never wanted him to again. He never wanted Sam in this fight. _Had_ never wanted him in this fight. Dean might be built and bred for it, but Sam was not. Sam was meant for a different kind of life. Not because he was weaker or a poor fighter, but because he was better. He was so much better.

‘Dean?’

Dean blinked and looked down into Sam’s wide, worried eyes. Somehow he had managed to tangle his fingers in the curls at the nape of Sam’s neck and fist them in his frustration at the undertow of emotions trying to pull him under. Sam’s thin fingers crawled over the back of his hand and tried to pry it loose. Dean let go, all of a sudden, and jerked away like he’d been burnt. Sam’s eyes filled and his breath caught on the back of a choked cry, and Dean hated himself. He tried again, putting his hands to either side of Sam’s face.

‘Shhh. Shh, Sam. It’s okay. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to scare you.’

‘Dean, please…lay down with me?’ Sam begged in a tiny voice. ‘So I can sleep?’

‘I…I need to clean the guns, kiddo, and get our supplies in order. Don’t know how long Dad’s gonna be gone this time,’ Dean hedged.

Sam nodded and turned his face away. Dean watched the exaggerated slow-motion rise and fall of his chest and knew that there were sobs punching at the tail end of each of his brother’s forced breaths fighting to get past his control, and he swore at himself.

‘Okay, Sam. Okay.’

Dean loosened his laces and toed off his boots and moved around the bed to lay down on top of the quilt.

‘You’ll get cold, Dean,’ Sam whispered. 

‘I’ll be fine, Sammy.’

They lay in silence, on their backs, staring up at the flickering patterns of light on the ceiling. There was a scant inch or two between them, but to Dean it felt like an impassable gulf. 

‘Dean, I—.’

‘Go to sleep, Sam,’ Dean cut him off quietly.

Sam tucked his chin to his chest and pressed his lips into a thin line and closed his eyes. He didn’t make another sound. Dean continued to stare at the ceiling until the fire died to embers and sleep, when it came, was sharp edged and fitful.


	5. Chapter 5

Dean would have expected Sam to be the one to wake on the muted edge of a scream from nightmares, not himself.

After all, Dean had been on lots of hunts with John, up against creatures nearly as terrible as the Gorabear. Sam, though, had not. He’d been on some straight up salt and burns and tangled with a few vengeful spirits, but he’d never been up against anything so lethal as he was last night.

So, it took Dean unawares when he was the one to jerk awake, chest tight, mouth forming Sam’s name on a silent scream, blinking away images of Sammy cold and pale lying in the trampled underbrush with John’s hands buried uselessly in his gored and shredded chest instead of holding together the flayed flesh of his thigh.

Fury surged up the back of Dean’s throat, and he threw himself from the bed, bracing himself on the sink and retching hard. He was furious with the creature for existing and hurting his brother; he was furious with John for uprooting them and dragging them out here where Sam could get hurt; but he was even more furious with Sam for throwing himself in harms way without a thought, and after all the years Dean had spent taking care of him, watching out for him, protecting him. He would go and throw himself headfirst into danger, and for what?

The answer made Dean’s knees buckle, and he dropped hard, forehead resting against the cold composite plastic of the sink.

Sam had done it for the same reasons John did, for the same reasons Dean did; he’d done it to protect his family. To protect Dean. 

‘Dammit, Sammy.’

Dean rolled over onto his hip, propped himself against the metal leg of the sink and dragged a trembling hand down his face.

How could he blame the kid for becoming what he and John were training him to be?

Across the room, Sam moaned a little in his sleep. Dean shoved up off the floor, rinsed his mouth and spit in the sink, and went back to the bed. Sam’s eyes were still closed. Dean brushed a hand across his forehead and cheek to be sure he wasn’t running a fever. He’d check the actual wound later when Sam woke up. For now, he just needed to sleep. The grey-blue of dawn was only just starting to lighten the grubby little panes of glass in the tiny windows and herd the dark shadows of night closer to the hearth where they clung to the last glow of dying embers there.

Dean slumped on the edge of the bed, hands between his knees, head hung low, trying to relinquish the last of his fury, to let it shiver itself out through his trembling hands and still rabbit-quick pulse. He needed to do something. He needed to keep his hands busy, to stop them from itching to touch Sam’s long, thin body stretched out under the quilt if only to reassure himself that he was still warm and alive and breathing.

He started to get up—the guns still needed cleaning along with Sam’s knives—when hesitant fingers picked at his shirt sleeve, fiddling with the button on the cuff and the thread coming loose from the frayed seam.

‘Hey, did I wake you?’ Dean asked softly, looking down at his brother’s long, absently plucking fingers.

Sam didn’t speak, just fluttered his sleepy eyes a time or two before giving in and letting them fall closed and stay that way. He curled his fingers into the fabric of Dean’s sleeve and gently tugged.

‘C’m back to bed. ’S too early,’

Dean covered Sam’s hand, gently disentangled his fingers, and laid it back on the bed.

‘Think I’m up for the day, kiddo, but you go back to sleep. Rest.’

Sam gave a little whine deep in his throat and Dean reached to stroke his hand through his brother’s hair. Sam turned into the touch, nestled into Dean’s palm, and a shaft of wanting speared through him so sharp and quick it took his breath away.

‘Sleep, Sammy. Sleep for a while longer.’

Dean unconsciously began to hum an old Zeppelin tune as he stroked Sam’s hair until his breathing evened out again and continued humming as he moved over to the fire with their duffle of weapons and pulled out Sam’s knives and started to meticulously clean them until they shown in the cold encroaching light of dawn.

——

Sam slept three more hours and by the time he woke, the tiny one room cabin was filled with the scent of cooking.

‘Dean?’ Sam elbowed into a half sitting position, knuckled at his eyes, and winced as the stitches in his leg pulled with his movement.

‘Heya, Sammy,’ Dean said with a grin. He flipped something vaguely round and very flat in the cast iron pan that overflowed the little hot plate on the counter. ‘You up for breakfast?’

Sam scented the air. ‘You made…pancakes?’

‘Yup.’

‘How?’ Sam’s eyes were wide in astonishment.

‘Had to get creative with some condensed milk, powdered eggs, and bread crumbs. Hey, baking soda doesn’t go bad, does it?’

Sam frowned in confusion. ‘I don’t think so, but Dean? You’re supposed to use baking _powder_.’

‘Eh, same thing,’ Dean shrugged.

Sam rolled his eyes and grinned. ‘Says the guy who put marshmallows in my mac and cheese.’

‘Hey! Don’t knock it. You loved that.’

‘Yeah. I did,’ Sam smirked. He threw back the covers and levered himself to the edge of the bed.

‘Hey, hey! Take it easy,’ Dean scolded. He flipped a flatter than normal pancake onto the plate beside the skillet (‘cause, yeah, maybe the kid was right, and it should have been baking powder) and threw the spatula down. He wiped his hands and strode to the bed, put a hand on Sam’s shoulder. ‘Where do you think you’re going?’

Sam scowled. ‘Dean, I gotta pee.’

‘Oh,’ Dean conceded. ‘Well, I don’t want you putting any weight on that leg just yet, so, here…’

Dean got Sam under the arms and slowly lifted him into a standing position, let Sam find his balance and get his feet under him, and then helped him limp to the bathroom. He got Sam stabilized and braced against the wall and then took a step back and turned around.

‘What? Not gonna hold it for me?’ Sam chided.

Dean nearly choked and spluttered some unintelligible answer and was eternally grateful that his back was to Sam so his little brother couldn’t see the sudden flush that leaped to his cheeks.

Sam just chuckled, did his business, and then smacked Dean on the back of the head to get his attention and they limped back across to the bed.

As Dean steadied Sam while he stretched out his aching back from lying in one position all night, he noticed how tall the kid was getting. He’d put on another couple of inches, sure, but Dean couldn’t recall when exactly he’d gone from fitting comfortably under Dean’s chin to being even with his nose and maybe a little more. He was still a skinny waif, but he was growing. Fast.

‘Dean, could I sit in the chair maybe?’

Dean blinked. ‘Yeah. Sure. We just need to keep you warm and keep that leg elevated.’

He helped Sam over to the dilapidated armchair and settled him into it with a blanket around his shoulders and one of the folding chairs under his calf to prop up his leg. Sam shifted around trying to get comfortable, and Dean cringed at every wince and caught breath, and it wasn’t all just from the wound on Sam’s leg.

‘I’ll work on your back later if you want,’ he offered quietly.

Sam looked up, surprise registering in his bright, hopeful eyes, and it cut at Dean to think Sam had come to expect him _not_ to want to touch him. 

‘That would be…great,’ Sam said in a small voice.

Dean nodded once and went back to the skillet and hot plate. Three more pancakes later he brought the stack over with half a bottle of honey under one arm and two cans of lukewarm soda.

‘Breakfast of champions,’ he said. He folded his legs up under him and sat down on the floor at Sam’s feet and offered up a soda.

Sam took it, grinning, with a raised eyebrow at the stack of suspiciously flat pancakes.

‘No syrup,’ Dean said as he squirted a liberal amount of honey on one of his creations and folded it in half and handed it to Sam.

Sam eyed it. ‘You said you used breadcrumbs and powdered eggs?’

‘Yup.’

‘Ooo-kay.’ Sam took a cautious bite and chewed gingerly. His brows lifted in pleasant surprise, and he took another bite. ‘Huh. Pretty not bad.’

‘I know, right?’ Dean winked. ‘’Cause I am awesome.’

Sam laughed outright and reached to cuff Dean gently upside the head. Dean turned at the last second and caught Sam’s finger between his teeth, bit down and held. It was a playful gesture he’d used so many times in the past, but now the side of his tongue slid across Sam’s skin, and he tasted honey and something even sweeter, and a spark of _wantlustneed_ ignited in his gut. He closed his lips without thinking and slowly sucked Sam’s finger clean.

‘Oh…’

Sam’s breath hitched and held. Dean’s eyes darted up, and he saw his brother’s lips parted on that breath, eyes wide and dark, folded pancake forgotten and dripping honey in his other hand. 

Dean quickly pushed Sam’s finger out of his mouth. He forced a grin past the knot in his belly and the tightening in his groin.

‘You’re makin’ a mess,’ he said, tilting his chin at the dripping honey in Sam’s hand.

‘Uh. Yeah.’ Sam stuffed another bite of pancake in his mouth and licked at the honey, hesitating a fraction of a second when his gaze smacked into Dean’s while the tip of his tongue scooped the sticky mess from between his fingers.

They ate most of the rest of the stack, finishing off the honey between them, in silence after that with Dean keeping his eyes fixed on the ghostly embers of last night’s fire and Sam sneaking nervous, furtive glances at his brother.

‘Dean, about last night—,’ Sam started.

‘Sam,’ Dean cut him off, waving a tired hand. ‘Look, you saved our asses last night, right? I can’t really complain about that. What I ought to be complaining about is how the hell Dad missed it in the research.’

Sam shrugged noncommittally. ‘Seems he’s doing more and more of his research at the bottom of a bottle these days.’

Dean glanced up sharply but then let it go with an uneasy shrug. Wasn’t like he could argue with the kid. John was going through a bad spell at the moment, it seemed. He’d ease back sooner or later, he always did, but until then Dean would worry about him on hunts. Would worry about both of them if he kept making oversights like this one.

‘Yeah, well, we’re still alive thanks to you, so…’

‘Then…you’re okay?’ Sam asked timidly.

Dean sighed long and deep and rubbed a hand over his hair. ‘Yeah, Sam. Yeah, I’m good.’

He raised his eyes to meet Sam’s and the kid looked so relieved that Dean couldn’t help but grin, and at seeing that swift quirk of his brother’s lips, Sam instinctively reached for him to tumble into his lap just like he used to do when he was little, but his stitches pulled sharply, and his back twinged hard enough to make him gasp.

Dean caught his shoulders and pressed him back. ‘Whoa, Sammy, take it easy.’

Sam leaned back in the chair, whimpered when the muscles in his lower back locked up, making his fingers curl convulsively around the arms of the chair.

‘Sam, relax,’ Dean instructed. He kept a hand on Sam’s shoulder as he reached for the rickety looking end table and pulled it in front of Sam’s chair. He really needed to get him back to bed, lay him out on his stomach and work him over, but he was afraid that would put too much pressure on the fresh stitches. So, he settled for testing his weight on the table and, finding it to be a bit more stable than it looked, he scooted as close to Sam as he could and then very carefully reached behind Sam’s thighs and lifted him into his lap.

Sam’s arms instantly went around Dean’s neck and his eyes flew open. ‘Dean, what are you—?’

‘Scoot forward, Sam,’ Dean said and lifted Sam closer across his thighs. Sam hissed in pain and Dean froze. ‘Leg?’

‘No,’ Sam huffed. ‘Back.’

Dean ran his hands up Sam’s back to his shoulders, pulling his full weight in to rest against his chest. ‘Lean into me. I’m gonna take care of your back.’

Sam didn’t hesitate to collapse into Dean’s chest, dropping his arms to hang loose at his brother’s hips and burying his face in the crook of his neck.

Dean felt the warm weight of his brother drape across him, and his dick was hard and aching with the sweet pressure, but he ignored it. It was not nearly as important as taking care of Sam. Taking care of Sam always came first, and armed with that, Dean could ignore the hot, smoldering coal of desire licking at his gut.

He spread his palms flat over Sam’s back and noticed how they didn’t span from shoulder to shoulder like they use to. Now, they fell an inch or two short and the angle down to Sam’s hips had gotten steeper, more defined. Dean dug his fingers into the thinned out layer of baby fat (and that was new, too) and deep into the muscles beneath on either side of Sam’s spine and slowly worked his way down and then back up, pushing his fingers all the way up into the hair at the back of Sam’s skull and rubbing hard and then working out over his shoulders and part way down his biceps (still whipcord thin, but definitely more defined) and then back in and down his back again.

He dipped down the back of Sam’s sweats, pressing hard into his lower back, working at the twitching muscles there. Sam moaned low and long, arching into Dean’s chest, and unconsciously rolling his hips down, and Dean felt a long, hard line of heat against his thigh. His breath left him in a rush, and Sam went utterly still beneath his hands.

‘Sam…?’

Sam got his hands against Dean’s chest and pushed. ‘Dean, I—.’

Sam leaned back, looking at Dean from beneath his tousled, brown silken curls. His cheeks were crested high and hot with sweet stains of color and his bottom lip, where it was caught between his teeth, was swollen and plush and pink and Dean could feel the tip of his tongue creeping between his own lips and licking in anticipation.

‘Dean, I—I’m sorry,’ Sam stammered. ‘Please, I didn’t mean—it’s not—.’

‘Sam.’

Dean took the chance of a lifetime in the next second, hoping to hell he was reading all the signals right. He covered Sam’s hand on his chest and dragged it slowly down his tight, quivering belly.

‘Dean?’ Sam breathed.

Dean brushed Sam’s fingers against the hard ridge of his erection through his jeans. This was it. Sam was either going to punch him out or scramble away in disgust—or both—or maybe, must maybe the hard heat he felt against his thigh was evidence of something else, of a need unfulfilled, a desire dark and unrequited.

Sam whimpered high and light at the contact and when Dean let his hand fall away, Sam’s fingers stayed, fluttering and uncertain against the bulge in his brother’s jeans.

‘Jesus, Dean…’

And here it came, Dean thought, bracing himself. The rejection delayed by shock. But then Sam’s fingers moved, and Dean felt the broad warmth of his brother’s palm engulf his swollen flesh and he moaned, hips instinctively rolling, scooping his pelvis forward to get more of that heavenly warmth. Sam’s palm curved and fit itself to Dean’s erection and then he squeezed, just a little.

Dean made an unintelligible sound that ended on a growl muffled against his brother’s clavicle where he had let his head fall to rest. Sam squeezed again, harder.

‘Oh fuck, Sammy,’ Dean punched out. His dick twitched painfully in the confined of his jeans and he felt the hot, hard knot in his belly that had been slowly tightening over the last months give a swift, hard tug that sent sparks of white fire across his vision. Sam fit his palm even closer around the bulge of Dean’s aching cock and pressed harder, letting the tips of his fingers scoop back under his brother’s balls and lift just a little.

‘Dean…’

Dean’s name sounded like a plea and a prayer on Sam’s lips and it made the knot in his belly slide tighter still and harder and put a lump in his throat that he could barely breathe around. Sam licked his lips at Dean’s ear, breath coming in sweet little huffs of sound, and then rolled the heel of his palm across the swollen head of Dean’s too ready cock and that was it. He was gone.

The white sparks became a raging fire that tore through Dean like he was so much bracken, dry from a hundred year drought. His fingers curled into Sam’s hips and jerked him forward. Sam hissed at the sudden sharp move and then Dean felt slender fingers dig into his biceps and Sam’s hips punched forward and Dean thought he heard a tiny startled cry over the rush of blood in his ears before his brother shuddered and slumped against him.

They sat in a sagging heap, tucked into each other, faces hidden in each other’s necks, breath coming harsh and uneven in the silence of the cabin.

‘Sam, did you…?’ Dean finally managed.

‘Yeah.’ Sam gave a jerky little nod. ‘Yeah, I did. Dean, I’m sorry, I—.’

He tried to lift his head, but Dean tucked it back hard against his shoulder. Just a second more. That’s all he wanted before the fucked-up reality of what he had just let happen crashed back in on them.

‘Shh, Sam. It’s all right. It’s gonna be all right. I promise.’

Sam nodded weakly and let his hands crawl up to clutch at the back of Dean’s shirt. Dean turned his mouth and nose into the tangle of soft hair above Sam’s ear and whispered tight and low,

‘I love you, Sammy. Always have, always will. You gotta remember that. So that someday, when you can forgive me for this, if you ever can, you call me. You call me and I’ll come. I’ll always come for you. You remember.’

‘Dean?’ Sam’s voice was sharp with fear and his hands fisted hard in Dean’s shirt, skinny arms tightening like steel bands when Dean tried to pull back, to set Sam away from him.

‘No, don’t,’ Sam begged. ‘Dean, don’t do this! This wasn’t you. It was me. Please, Dean!’

Dean forced Sam’s arms open and set him gently back in the chair and stood up. Wiry fingers clamped at his wrist when he turned away and hung on like the jaws of a bear trap. He looked down at himself and swore viciously. He was a mess, the front of his jeans and t-shirt damp with the evidence of his twisted lust.

‘Dean, don’t go.’

Sam’s voice had dropped deep like it did when he was making a last desperate plea for reason with John, and it sparked something in Dean’s chest, made him look down at his kid brother just weeks away from sixteen and see the rough sketch of the man he would grow into instead of the boy he was. 

‘Don’t you dare run, Dean. Don’t you dare. You didn’t do this. I _wanted_ this. I _wanted_ it.’

Dean glanced down at the front of Sam’s sweats, wet blossom of his release spread like a stain to show the world their sin. No, Dean’s sin. Because this was on him. Sam would never have done this if Dean hadn’t tempted him, if he hadn’t given in to that one second of weakness.

‘You don’t know what you’re saying, Sam.’

Sam’s fingers cinched tighter, ground down on the bones of Dean’s wrist, and his eyes flashed with fire.

‘I’m nearly sixteen, Dean, I—.’

‘You’re a fucking child!’ Dean snapped.

Sam jerked back in shock, grip loosening enough momentarily that Dean could wrench his wrist free and get a few feet between them. Sam looked stunned and angry, eyes filling up fast with tears, lips pressing into a thin line, and Dean could almost hear the kid silently telling himself not to cry after he’d just declared himself grown up enough to commit an act of underage sexual incest with his brother.

‘So, what, Dean?’ Sam shot back. ‘I’m old enough to feel you up and get you to come so hard your eyes roll back in your fucking skull without hardly touching you, but I’m not old enough to know what I want!’

Dean flinched at the crass description of what they’d just done. ‘Fuck, Sam…’

‘Sure, Dean, I’m up for that, too,’ Sam bit out. ‘Oh, but wait…I don’t know what the fuck I want because, ‘I’m still a fucking child!’’

‘Sammy, I—.’

‘You know what, Dean? Just—,’ Sam lurched out of the chair without thinking and then bit back a cry at the sharp pain that lanced across his thigh, and he started to stumble.

Dean moved the same instant Sam did and had him under the arms and held tight against him before he even thought.

‘Dammit, Sam, you’ll pull your stitches,’ Dean whispered harshly.

Sam whimpered in pain and hid his face in Dean’s shoulder, fingers twisted up so tight in the fabric that his knuckles were white, until he could breathe normally again. Dean tried to ease him back down into the chair but Sam shook his head, refusing to let go.

‘Sam, we need to get you off that leg. I need to check the stitches,’ Dean said. ‘You wanna lay down on the bed?’

Sam gave a reluctant nod that said, no, he really didn’t, but of the choices available, it would have to do. Dean hitched him up tight against his side and practically carried him to the bed, Sam’s toes just barely grazing the floor. Dean let him down slow and lifted his legs up onto the mattress. He reached for the waistband of Sam’s sweats, hesitated a fraction of a second, and then tugged them down carefully.

He tried to ignore the cooling, sticky film of cum on his brother’s hip and thigh and lower belly as he examined the bandage for signs of bleeding. He tried not to let the half hard length of his brother’s ample endowment catch him off guard when he’d expected a soft, flaccid, spent cock to be tucked between his thighs.

He felt his nostrils flare out in betrayal of his notice and forced his concentration to gently unwrapping the bandage to get a look at the wound and stitches underneath. Thankfully, everything looked intact and the edges of the wound weren’t red or puffy or hot with any signs of infection, and there was very little oozing, so Dean slathered it liberally with another layer of ointment and put fresh gauze over it and rewrapped it.

‘I’ll get a washcloth to clean you up,’ Dean said quietly, and pushed off his knees to retrieve said washcloth from the bathroom.

He tried for quick and efficient in wiping Sam down, but his hands betrayed him and moved slowly, lovingly over the dip of Sam’s narrow hipbone, down the warm skin of his inner thigh, and over the soft white expanse of his belly that was lightly dusted with fine dark hairs that curled like the ones on his head. He smoothed the washcloth over the length of Sam’s cock and felt it grown warm and swell under his touch.

Sam made a tiny sound in his throat, and Dean glanced up to see him looking back, heavy lidded, lips parted, cheeks pink and flushed, and under his hand that had stilled without his knowing on his brother’s cock he felt Sam twitch and grow harder.

‘Jesus, Sam,’ Dean choked out between ragged breaths, willing himself to move his hand and let go of Sam’s hot gaze.

Sam licked his lips slowly. Whether it was a conscious gesture or not, Dean’s cock didn’t care. It bulged eagerly in his jeans, ready and willing to respond to all the not so subtle signals of want rolling off of Sam’s body.

‘Dean, I know you don’t believe me—,’ Sam started.

‘Sam, this is all me,’ Dean cut him off. ‘It’s sick and twisted, and I know—I _know_ —I’m wrong…’

He stumbled, shoulders slumping, gaze still locked with Sam’s.

‘Then that makes two of us,’ Sam whispered, and he rolled his hips upward, pressing the full, hard length of his cock into his brother’s palm and moaning as if to prove his point.

Dean answered with a guttural groan of his own. He moved the washcloth and his hand, and Sam whined in protest until he saw Dean staring at the hard, long, blood fattened organ and licking his lips. Dean had never put his mouth on another man. Never wanted to. Sure, he’d gone down on lots of girls. Safer that way. Not like he needed a string of illegitimate rug rats trailing across forty-eight state lines. But men had never appealed. Just Sam. And his mouth was practically watering at the thought of curving his tongue over that velvet soft head that was stretched and full and rigid and wanting.

He sucked in a breath and rolled his tongue around his mouth, trying to dispel the thought, but Sam had started rocking his hips on the bed and his cock was now front and center and so full it was standing up off his flat belly on its own, begging—just _begging_ —for Dean’s mouth.

He obliged it.

Dean dipped down and pressed his lips to the bulging vein that ran the length of his little brother’s cock, and Sam nearly squealed in shocked response. Dean couldn’t help the grin that split his face. He wanted to hear Sam make that sound again. So, he shifted sideways, putting more of his weight up on the bed, reached across Sam’s thighs and braced himself up. Then he licked a long, slow, wide stripe up his brother’s cock from base to  swollen head.

‘Holy shit!’ Sam nearly shouted, and he twisted on the mattress, one hand fisting tight in the sheets, the other reaching up under his t-shirt and spreading over his chest, reaching for a hard, pert nipple to pinch between his fingers.

Dean watched in rapt astonishment from under his lashes and had to shift positions because his own cock was getting too hard and too full to be trapped inside his jeans.

‘Take it out, Dean,’ Sam panted high and light. ‘I wanna see it.’

Dean groaned again and reached with one hand to undo his zipper and lay open his jeans so that at least the only remaining pressure against his overfull erection was the blessedly soft cotton of his boxer briefs. Sam’s eyes zeroed in on the swollen ridge of flesh and widened in appreciation.

Before he could become too self-conscious under Sam’s intense gaze, Dean made another pass at his brother’s cock with his tongue, this time lingering at the full, soft, mushroomed head and sliding the tip of his tongue under the ridge and tracing it around one side and back and over to the other. Then he daringly flicked it over the slit and caught the first heady taste of Sam on his tongue.

He had expected—well, he didn’t know what he expected, but not the double barrel force of shock from the sweet, musky taste on the tip of his tongue laced with salt and tasting of all Sam. He pursed his lips and pressed them to the very tip of Sam’s cock and sucked ever so lightly, tasting another drop of pre-cum against his lips.

Sam whined and twisted under him. ‘Dean! Dean, stop…please, stop. I’m gonna come… You’re gonna make me come again.’

‘That’s the idea, Sammy,’ Dean hummed against Sam’s hot, stretched flesh, licking the head with a broad flat stroke for emphasis.

Sam shivered, full body. 'N-no. Dean, I wanna—I want to come with you this time.’

‘Did the last time, baby brother.’

Sam tossed his head on the pillow in frustration. ‘I mean, I want to come against you. Want to feel you, Dean…sliding…’

Sam couldn’t seem to get out any more words. His face was flushed like he had a high fever and his eyes were shining a bright mosaic of blue and green and gold as if they were lit from within. Dean swore he’d never seen anything so beautiful.

‘Sam, I…I don’t want to hurt you—.’

‘You won’t,’ Sam insisted, getting a fist in Dean’s shirt and tugging him upward.

‘We can’t put pressure on that leg, Sam,’ Dean cautioned, and was met with the biggest, saddest, most desperate eyes, and his heart just turned right over in his chest. He stood up beside the bed and shucked his jeans and shirt without ceremony and then reached down to carefully tug Sam’s legs the rest of the way free of his sweats. He got an arm under Sam’s shoulders and lifted him into a sitting position, then held him while he scooted in behind him and leaned up against the wall. ‘C’mere, Sammy,’

Dean wrapped his arms around Sam’s chest and lifted him up, pulling him back up to sit on his thighs with his back to Dean’s chest. Sam tensed momentarily. 

‘Dean—.’

‘Shhh, shhh,’ Dean soothed, situating Sam closer and shifting his leg so it was crooked to support Sam’s wounded thigh. ‘We’re not gonna do that. Not until you’re ready. I promise.’

Sam melted back into Dean, all of his muscles going loose and just becoming a puddle of warm wanting in Dean’s arms. Dean slid down the bed just a little, enough that he could curl his hips up underneath Sam and let him feel the long, hard heat of Dean’s erection rubbing up under his balls, gliding against the underside of his own fully engorged flesh.

Sam shivered, whined, rocked his hips back and forth and almost cried at the glorious, sweet friction of their cocks sliding together. ‘Dean…oh, God…’

Dean made sure to keep enough attention on Sam’s leg that it didn’t get moved in any way that would hurt him, and then spread his hands across Sam’s chest, brushing calloused fingers across the hard nubs of Sam’s flushed nipples. Sam moaned so prettily that Dean did it again, and again, and when he heard his own answering moan rise up to meet Sam’s, he muffled it against his brother’s neck, biting down gently and sucking, drawing patterns against his heated skin with the tip of his tongue until Sam reached up with both hands to the back of Dean’s head and tried to find purchase for his long fingers in his too short hair.

‘Dean, oh God…touch me. Please,’ Sam begged. He pushed one of Dean’s hands down between his legs where their cocks were slip-sliding together in a still uneven and unpracticed rhythm. ‘Please, Dean…wanna feel us…go together.’

Sam was gasping, rocking, moaning, trying desperately to find the friction that would give him the release he needed. He wasn’t going to last long. Not much longer than it was going to take Dean to get a grip on him. That didn’t matter, though, because none of Dean’s dreams had prepared him for the real thing, for Sam’s warm, sweat and cum slicked ass grinding down against his groin. For all the visions he’d had of Sam naked and wanton and begging Dean to touch every inch of his skin, Dean was not prepared for the lapful of hot, sexy brother he had trying to ride him right now, and he was only a couple of minutes and a few good strokes away from shooting the load of his lifetime all over both of them.

Dean scooped his broad palm down between Sam’s thighs and lifted his balls, rolling them in his fingers until Sam nearly screamed in frustration, then fisted their cocks together and pumped slow and easy a few times to bring Sam in line with his rhythm. Sam’s head lolled back on Dean’s shoulder, mouth going lax in the certainty that what he most needed was only seconds away, and he let out the filthiest, loveliest moan, bringing his hips forward in time with Dean’s thrusting, pushing his cock into Dean’s fist.

‘That’s it, Sam,’ Dean whispered, pushing his nose up under Sam’s ear and licking and nibbling at the softer than soft skin. ‘That’s perfect. Just like that.’

‘Jesus, Dean…I’m gonna…I can’t hold it,’ Sam panted.

Dean felt a thin, constant trickle of wet heat drip over his fingers, slicking his grip and letting him fist them even tighter so that Sam groaned mightily and his fingers dug in at the back of Dean’s neck where his hand still rested. The other hand he cupped over their bulbous, swollen heads on the Dean’s down stroke and gave a slick twist and squeeze.

‘Fuck!’ Dean jolted at the sensation of Sam’s hand on him and his head smacked the wall behind him. ‘Christ, Sam, that’s…’

Sam did it again, turning his head so that he could suck at a soft spot under Dean’s jaw at the same time.

‘Holy God, Sam…’ Dean gasped. ‘I can’t—it’s too good—Jesus!’

Dean thrust up into his own fist, felt Sam slide against him, and then Sam’s wet palm was there squeezing and rolling across their swollen heads and they were coming together hot and hard, Sam crying out long and low and shuddering like he might come to pieces while Dean tried remember how to make his lungs work and pull in air as he pushed back up toward the surface of whatever deep pool of sensory overload his orgasm had thrown him into. 

Sam collapsed in a boneless heap against Dean, breathing so hard, that for a second Dean was afraid the exertion had been too much.

‘Sam? Sammy, you okay?’ Dean whispered urgently at his brother’s ear, cupping his jaw with his free, clean hand. ‘Sammy?’

‘'M good,’ Sam mumbled, and Dean could hear the sleepy smile in his voice. ‘Soooo…good.’

Dean grinned in relief and let his head drop back against the wall. He never wanted to move again. He couldn’t remember ever coming so hard in his life. None of the fantasies he’d built of Sam that had seen him through so many long hot showers came anywhere close to the real thing. He felt empty, drained, and exhausted, but it was a good empty, the kind that came after some incredibly important decision had been made and the only course of action now was to follow the flow of that decision. 

Dean patted around the bed for the damp cloth that was now cold, but at least it was something, and wiped them both down quickly and tugged the quilt up and over them, tucking it under Sam’s chin and around his shoulders. 

‘Stay,’ Sam murmured sleepily.

‘Not goin’ anywhere, little brother,’ Dean answered as he settled his arms more firmly around Sam’s chest.

‘Good.’

It was the last thing Sam mumbled before he drifted back to sleep, and Dean was close behind him.


	6. Chapter 6

Dean woke to the tickle of soft hair under his nose and the scent of _hotsweetsamsex_ clinging to every pore of his body.

His eyes shot open and he looked down, stomach knotted in sudden unreasonable fear, to find Sam looking back at him, his hazel eyes clear and shining and smiling, happier than he could remember seeing the kid in a long, long time.

Sam lifted a hand to press against Dean’s jaw, rubbing his thumb lightly over the growing stubble. ‘It’s okay,’ he whispered.

Dean relaxed incrementally. His stomach unknotted a little and let him take a breath. It was okay. Sam said it was okay. Sam was okay with what they had done. Dean’s brain worked to process that and soak in the full meaning, but it did not entirely dispel his fear because there was a shitload of ‘what-ifs’ that went with this, and he knew what they had _done_ , but he wasn’t sure what it had _meant_.

Something in his face must have given away the doubts crowding in on him because Sam turned more fully into his chest, gingerly swinging his legs to the side and letting them drape over Dean’s thigh, and then reaching around his brother to wrap him in a steel banded hug that nearly took his breath away again.

‘I love you, Dean,’ he said softly, tucking his head under Dean’s chin and turning enough to brush his lips against the hollow between Dean’s collar bones. ‘I didn’t do this just to get off, you know. I did it— _wanted_ to do it—because I love you.’

‘I love you too, Sammy,’ Dean said. It was a rote response. Of course he loved his little brother, and of course his little brother loved him. That’s the way it had always been, but there was another layer here now. Sam was trying to tell him that, and he had to be careful, to be sure that Sam knew he understood that when he said it.

‘Dean?’

Dean tipped Sam’s head back with a finger under his chin and looked down at him. For a long stretch of heartbeats, they stayed like that, and Dean could see the soft green of his own eyes buried deep and reflected back in his little brother’s gaze. He rubbed a thumb along Sam’s bottom lip until his mouth parted on a breath and a tiny, needy sound, and then Dean dipped his head very slowly to press his lips ever so lightly to his brother’s. He rested them there, just barely touching, sharing the air with Sam, feeling the tremble that was working its way out from Sam’s mouth to the rest of his body. He angled his head and pressed closer, just a gentle pressure to mold them together, nothing demanding, nothing wanting, just warmth and mutual giving. 

Sam’s trembling increased, rising in frequency, and Dean angled the kiss deeper, parting his lips just a little and letting his tongue sweep very softly across Sam’s bottom lip. Sam keened, long and low, and Dean felt the full-on shiver that might be a precursor to a sob ripple through his brother’s body. He delved deeper, slipping his tongue past Sam’s lips and tasting the sweet, wet heat of his brother’s mouth, pushing their tongues together, enjoying the soft velvety slide until Sam was struggling to breath past the sobs forcing their way up out of his chest, and he tore his mouth from Dean’s and buried his face in his brother’s throat and cried so hard Dean was afraid he might have done something wrong.

‘Sammy. Sammy, I’m sorry, I didn’t—.’

‘No…no, it’s—,’ Sam tried to choke out, tilting his tear stained face back up so he could look at Dean. He was smiling, unbelievably. ‘I just dreamed…so many times…of this. Just this. And it’s…perfect, Dean. You made it perfect.’

Dean felt tears of his own threatening at Sam’s soft, broken confession and the light in that smile did something to his insides, worked its way in and started to take all the shadows apart, filtering through the cracks and building up in intensity until he felt like he might fly apart into a million particles of light. Photons, didn’t Sam say that’s what they were called? 

Dean laughed despite himself and cupped the back of Sam’s head and kissed him again, long and deep. He could do this forever. He didn’t need anything else. Never another thing for as long as he lived.

‘You’re my everything, Sam. Always,’ Dean whispered against Sam’s mouth. ‘I’ve got you. And I’m never gonna let you go.’

Fresh tears surged past Sam’s lashes as he pressed up into another kiss, felt Dean’s warm palms cradle his face, because it was the best confession of love Sam had even heard or read about. And it was all his. Forever.


End file.
